by Debra Webb
Jess blew out a puff of frustrated air. “Those stories about me are more about hype than about truth.”
“Hey, I wasn’t talking about you.” She nodded toward the house. “The Debarros filed several complaints against the investigators when their daughter went missing. I saw the notations. Everything from racism to plain old disrespect. There may be a few shoulders with big ass chips on them in there.”
Jess moistened her lips and smiled even though she suddenly felt like crying. Had to be the lack of sleep and the frustration of getting nowhere on this case. Not to mention this damned smear campaign was getting to her. The exhaustion and frustration were making it way too easy.
“Come on.” Lori flashed a real smile. “Let’s find that big break we’ve been praying for.”
Jess followed the detective across the yard. There was no sidewalk in front of the small box of a house. No porch. Just a set of steps that led to the front door. No shrubbery or flowers. Just grass and ruts where as much of the lawn was used as driveway as not.
Lori stood on the top step and rapped on the door. She really was a good detective and a nice lady. Friend material. Jess hadn’t had time for friends in a long time. The detective was attractive, too. Tall, slender, with long brown hair. Chet had better sharpen his game, this lady was a catch.
And the perfect example of the Player’s type.
Jess shuddered, instinctively surveyed the narrow paved road that had brought them here. Five or six other small houses dotted the road, woods crowded up behind them.
Another knock brought someone to the door. Lively music greeted them as it opened. It was Saturday afternoon. Rest and relaxation time for lots of hardworking folks.
A Hispanic man filled the doorway. He looked from Lori to Jess, out to the red 1967 Mustang they had arrived in and then back. “You lost, ladies?”
“Are you Jorge Debarros?” Lori asked.
“Depends.” He leaned on the doorframe. “Are you Megan Fox?”
Lori showed her badge. “We need to speak with Mr. Debarros, please.”
The man stared at her for a moment longer, blatantly enjoying the frame he imagined lay beneath her reserved slacks and blouse. “Jorge!” he shouted over his shoulder. He shifted his attention back to the unexpected visitors. “Come on in, ladies.”
Her right hand instinctively going to the center of her back where her holstered weapon was nestled, Lori followed him inside.
Jess was right behind her, studying the living room with its worn but clean furnishings and bare wood floors. The pale green walls were heavy with rows of framed photographs. One of the larger ones drew her across the room. Christina. Probably a school photo. Her dark features and big smile made for a very photogenic face. Though Jess had seen the case photo, this one showed the mere child that Christina had been. Far too young, in Jess’s opinion, to have been engaged in sexual activity.
The music shut off and the voices in the next room hushed.
Another man came into the room. He stopped several feet away. “What do you want?”
Jorge Debarros spoke near perfect English with scarcely a hint of an accent. Like the interior of his home, he was neatly dressed and clean-shaven.
“Mr. Debarros, I’m Detective Wells from the Birmingham Police and this is Agent Harris of the FBI.”
He glanced at Jess. “What do you want?” he repeated.
Jess reserved judgment. The gentleman appeared to have had some trouble with the investigation of his missing daughter. It was doubtful that he would be disposed to cooperation.
“Mr. Debarros,” Jess approached him and extended her hand, “I’m here to follow up on your daughter Christina’s disappearance.”
He snorted a laugh, didn’t bother to take her hand. “Right, after almost six years? I came to you people,” he directed this at Lori, “over and over again the first two years my Christina was missing and nothing changed. Why should I believe anything has changed now?”
“What is this, Jorge?”
Jess looked past Mr. Debarros to the woman who hovered at the doorway between the living room and what might be the kitchen since that was where it sounded like all the other folks in the house were gathered. Her accent was heavy, the trepidation in her voice even heavier.
“Nothing. Stay in the kitchen!”
The woman backed away from the doorway. Mr. Debarros’s attention swung back to Jess.
“I don’t want to disturb your family and your guests. Can we talk outside, sir?”
He didn’t answer, didn’t move for several seconds. Then he walked out the door without a glance at either of them.
Jess shared a look with Lori, before exiting the house. Whatever happened during the investigation all those years ago, the Debarros family felt wronged. Giving BPD grace, it was difficult to persuade a family that all possible had been done when their child remained missing.
They stood in the neglected front yard in a wary triangle. There was nothing Jess could say to ease the loss he had suffered. But if anything this man told her helped find the missing girls, perhaps it would be worth the pain that her questions would no doubt awaken.
“Have you found my Christina?”
“No, sir. I’m sorry. We haven’t found her.”
Devastation lined his face. “Then why are you here?”
“We need to ask you a few questions about your daughter’s disappearance.”
“Because of the missing white girls?”
Jess didn’t blink. She held his relentless stare. “Yes, sir.”
One, two, three, four seconds elapsed. “So ask.”
“Would you tell me about Christina? What was going on in her life those last few days and weeks before she disappeared?”
“She was a very good student.” His deep voice trembled. “We believed she would be the first in our family to go to college.” He took another stretch of time to compose himself. “She started staying late after school to work on a special project. After that project it was another and then another. One day it was almost dark and she still wasn’t home. I was worried and I went to the school to pick her up.”
His tension visibly built as he spoke. “She was already halfway home. Walking. I noticed something on her neck.” He touched his throat. “A red mark. When we got home I demanded answers. She swore it was from a fight she’d had with a friend but I knew it wasn’t true. It was a lover’s mark, but I didn’t want to believe that.” He shrugged, the gesture listless. “My Christina had never been in trouble so I let it go with a warning.”
He fell silent, his head bowed.
Jess exchanged another look with Lori.
“Mr. Debarros, what happened after that?”
His entire being shuddered. “Three weeks later she vanished. She went to school one day and she never came back.” He lifted his head, eyes red, tears on his cheeks. “They said she never came to school that day.”
Her pulse hammering, Jess moistened her lips. “Sir, what did you do after that?”
“We called the police. Started to look for her. Called all her friends. Her teachers. No one knew anything.” A sort of calmness settled over him. “Then my wife confessed what she knew. Christina had a boyfriend. She told her mother she had stopped having her monthly. Her mother was afraid to tell me.”
“When your wife admitted this to you, what did you do?”
“I told the police. They questioned the boy but he denied knowing Christina. His friends backed him up. The only proof I had was Christina and she was gone. They wouldn’t believe my wife. She spoke little English so that made her nothing in their eyes.”
“Did you confront the boy?”
He nodded. “I followed him home from school and confronted him and his father. They both denied what my Christina had said and they called the police. The cops said if I bothered the Murrays again I would go to jail.” He shook his head. “Every week I called and nothing. I stopped calling three years ago when I heard of his death. My Christina was still l
ost to me but at least he was in hell.”
Jess struggled to draw in a breath. “Warrior is a small town. Have you run into his parents since this happened?”
“Once.”
Jess waited for him to go on.
“I stopped for gas and he was there for the same thing. He looked at me and I looked at him. I told him that now he knew how I felt, then I got back in my truck and drove away.”
“Your wife,” Jess said, “she’s certain Tate Murray is the boy your Christina said got her pregnant?”
He nodded. “It was him. I saw it in his eyes when I confronted him after my Christina disappeared. It was him.”
“Sir, you filed complaints about the investigators in your daughter’s case. Will you tell me what happened?”
“My wife was not a citizen. But I and my daughter were…are. It was my wife’s word against the Murrays. There was no other proof. Christina had not told any of her friends. If she did, none would say. Last year the man in charge of the investigation died of a heart attack. I felt no sympathy for him or his family. He did not care if he found my Christina.”
“Mr. Debarros, I am so sorry your daughter has not been found. I promise you, sir, that I’ll personally see to it that her case is reopened.” Jess extended her hand once more. “Thank you for your time, sir.”
This time he closed his hand around hers and shook it.
He didn’t say thank you or ask her any questions. He went back into his home and rejoined his family.
Lori looked as if she’d eaten a bad burger. “What’s wrong, Detect—Lori?”
She headed for the car, prompting Jess to do the same.
“Now that was creepy,” Lori said over the roof of the car to Jess.
“How so?”
“That detective he was talking about who had the heart attack? That was Joe Newberry.” Lori opened her door. “His heart attack opened up a detective’s spot for me.”
“And here you are,” Jess suggested, “picking up the ball it appears he dropped.”
Jess looked back at the Debarros’ home as Lori backed out onto the road. A face was pressed to the glass of one of the front windows. Looked like the woman who had been ordered back into the kitchen.
Christina’s mother.
Jess stared at the window until she could no longer see the house. She faced forward and made up her mind what had to be done next. Burnett would be livid when he found out. He was going to be hell-raising, fire-spitting mad anyway. What was another degree or two?
“Are we going back to the office?”
Now for the next hurdle. “Eventually. First, we’re paying a visit to the Murrays.”
Lori glanced at her. “You have a plan?”
“I don’t need a plan.” The sudden urgency nudging at her wouldn’t wait. She wanted to go now.
“Because…” Lori prodded.
“Because we just reopened a cold case in which the Murray family are persons of interest.”
“We did,” Lori agreed. “The Murrays don’t have to talk to us, but making the attempt to question them is not only appropriate it’s our job.”
Oh, yes. Detective Wells had the right stuff.
“I don’t get it,” Lori said. “If the Murrays are involved, why would they do this? There’s nothing in their backgrounds to indicate trouble.”
Jess didn’t have to consider the question. She had already formed a basic profile on the couple, even though she had only met the husband. “Denial. Their only child died suddenly. They appear to be common, salt-of-the-earth people. Probably no education above high school. Hard working. Family is everything. Their son was their whole life.”
“They sure wouldn’t want his future ruined with an unexpected pregnancy before he’d even finished high school,” Lori suggested.
“Absolutely not.” Jess understood the human psyche and its fragility. “If our theory is correct, whatever happened to Christina was the first act of evil. Their consciences were bruised, but denial helped them rationalize their actions. When their son died, the loss was so profound, denial took over again. It was their only hope to survive the emotional devastation. The only safe place they could escape to.”
“Denial can be that powerful?”
That was something Jess knew a little something about from personal experience. “In extreme cases, denial can be immensely powerful. Couple it with something like obsession and you have a recipe for tragedy.”
“Okay, I guess I can see that,” Lori said. “But why abduct these girls now? All these years later? What’s the motive?”
“That depends on the need that has been nurtured by the denial.” That was also the part Jess had the least insight into at this point. “Are they looking to replace his absence with a daughter? A son would be too painful, almost as if they were trying to replace him. The other possibility is that they are in complete denial and are looking for a companion for him. If their son had lived he would have perhaps graduated from college. Maybe be engaged.”
“That’s sick.” Lori shook herself.
Jess shrugged. “There are far worse scenarios.”
Lori glanced at her, dread in her eyes. “You mean like Spears.”
“Evil comes in all shapes and sizes,” Jess explained. She had spent years studying the levels and faces of evil. “You have sociopaths like Eric Spears who rank at the very highest level of the scale, tormenters. His singular motive is pleasure. The only way he can feel it is to torture his victims in the most depraved ways. He feeds on the fear. The murder itself is actually secondary. It’s all about the pain he can inflict before he takes their lives. The longer they pleasure him, the longer he keeps them alive. He plays the game.”
“By pleasure him,” Lori questioned, “you mean entertain him?”
“That’s right. Their reactions give him pleasure. Excite him.”
“How do you analyze freaks like that with any kind of objectivity?”
“You set all emotions aside and focus on the facts.” The memory of staring into Spears’ cold eyes twisted in her belly. “Then you hope the bastard gets what’s coming to him when the courts are finished.”
“Do you think the girls are being tortured? Could the Murrays be that twisted?”
“I can’t assess that just yet. The fact that we don’t have any bodies may indicate that the girls are alive. Or it could simply be that we haven’t found them yet. The only aspect of this case that lends itself to the option of revenge is Dana Sawyer. She was his girlfriend who went on with her life without him.”
There were too many missing details for her to build a comprehensive profile. “My guess is they’re shopping for a daughter or a daughter-in-law.”
“That could mean the girls are alive,” Lori offered with another quick look in Jess’s direction.
“Don’t mistake a lesser ranking when it comes to depravity with a lack of proclivity toward violence. Even a simple obsession can turn deadly. Particularly if the plan goes wrong.”
Burnett had insisted Andrea was strong and smart. Jess hoped he was right. “If, as I suspect, these people have planned this for a long time, then, in their minds, their entire existence depends on this—whatever it is—going as planned. Failure would destroy the world they’ve built to escape reality.”
“We have to approach with caution.”
“We do.” Speaking of caution, Jess dared to check her cell. Two missed calls from Burnett, one from Lily. “Damn.” She’d set it to vibrate. Good thing.
“Me, too,” Lori said. “Two calls from the chief, three from Harper.”
“The reception isn’t very good out here.” The woods, the mountains. They were miles and miles off the main road.
“Not very good at all,” Lori agreed.
They rode in silence for a few minutes, anticipation thumping inside Jess. It had to mean something that the Murray family kept popping back into the mix. She needed just one suspicious word or deed out of the father. He’d been happy to talk when she and B
urnett stopped by. All she had to do was keep Lori cooperative.
“You and Harper serious?” Jess asked. Time to lower the tension. Calm. Focus. By the time they reached the Murray place, they both needed to be at the very top of their game.
Lori sent her a questioning glance. “About work, yes.”
Jess laughed. “I see the way he looks at you.” She also saw the way Lori looked at him.
“He doesn’t fit into my plan outside work.” She didn’t sound convinced.
“Sometimes we have to revise our plans.” Jess relaxed into the headrest. Sleep had eluded her last night. With them no closer to finding the girls and her professional reputation being ripped to shreds on the news, it was no wonder. Being stuck under the same roof with Burnett hadn’t helped.
“What about you and the chief?”
“What about us?”
“I see the way he looks at you.”
She’d asked for that. Jess shook her head. “What you’re seeing is familiarity. Our relationship was over a long time ago.”
“If you say so.”
Before Jess could set her straight, Lori asked, “You mind if I stop at that convenience store on 31? I need a restroom.”
“I could use something to drink.” They had skipped lunch and the lack of fuel was catching up with her now.
Jess watched the wooded landscape evolve into the small town of Warrior. It still rattled her that evil could happen in such a serene natural setting. But it did. Every minute of every day.
“Did you restore this yourself?” Jess didn’t know that much about cars but she had been raised in the south. A Shelby Cobra Mustang of this era was a highly sought after vehicle.
“It was my father’s.” Lori smiled as her hands caressed the steering wheel. “When I turned sixteen, my mother gave it to me.” She released a big breath. “He died when I was a kid. She’d kept it in the garage for me all that time.”
“Sorry.” Something else they had in common. “I lost my parents when I was a kid, too.”
“That’s one reason my career is so important.” Lori glanced at her. “My mother and younger sister depend on me financially.”
